Increasing the Resilience of Vulnerable Citizens to Natural Hazards and Disasters: A Knowledge Exchange Event

The Centre for Environmental Change and Human Resilience (CECHR)at the University of Dundee, with the Social Dimensions of Health Institute (SDHI) of the Universities of Dundee and St Andrews, are hosting a knowledge exchange event on Wednesday 28th September 2011: ‘Increasing the Resilience of Vulnerable Citizens to Natural Hazards and Disasters’. A growing body of policy and academic evidence has identified the particular vulnerabilities of older people, disabled people and people with chronic illness in natural disaster events, and the need for improved emergency preparedness planning and capacity building amongst individuals and their families, health and social care providers, emergency services, and local and national government.

With the likelihood of increased frequency and severity of floods, storms, heat waves and severe cold weather, identifying the vulnerability of older people, disabled people and people with chronic illness, and building resilience at all scales, are issues requiring immediate academic and policy attention.

The event will bring together policy makers, practitioners and academic researchers, to pool information and ideas around vulnerability and resilience, emergency responsibilities and responses, and information access and accessibility.

The event will involve presentations, interactive sessions, panel discussions and networking. More information will be made available shortly.

Funding secured for SDHI day of public engagement.

SDHI has secured funding from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) towards the SDHI day of public engagement on October 29th 2011 as part of the ESRC’s festival of Science. The event will take place in the Steps theatre and Dundee central library in the Wellgate shopping centre, Dundee.

Psychosocial services for children with cancer often not evidence-based

A comprehensive survey of psychosocial services offered to families of children with cancer through 127 hospitals organised in the Children’s Oncology Group (COG) has shown that many services are not systematically developed and offered on the basis of research evidence. Most services struggle with funding and time constraints. Great heterogeneity exists in terms of the type of services that are currently being offered in most institutions. More multi-site collaboration is needed to develop evidence-based standards of care. The survey is the largest to date on the availability of psychosocial services within COG member institutions. The findings of the study have been published in Pediatric Blood & Cancer http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/pbc.23235/abstract

Making health care safer CONFERENCE 2011`

Making health care safer:
learning from social and organizational research

27th-28th June 2011, St Andrews, Scotland

The two day conference explored key questions facing researchers, practitioners and policy-makers: questions that addressed better collective learning, sustainable quality improvement and safer patient care

The meeting took place in St Andrews over two days and included discussion and debate, with plenary sessions, interactive workshops and provided a range of opportunities for networking and learning. Click here for further information

Professor Huw Davies welcomes delegates to the conference.

Mary Dixon-Woods talks about the Safer Patients Initiative and the challenges in studying patient safety.

Naomi Fulop on Organisational and social perspectives on patient safety.

Delegates viewing posters during a break between sessions.

Delegates viewing posters during a break between sessions.

Justin Waring on the future of patient safety research and paractice.

Concluding remarks from David Steel.

Shared decision-making and personal values

SDHI based Professor Vikki Entwistle discusses in a televised interview the importance of values in decision-making situations in health care encounters. Individual values influence how health information is understood, what is shared in practice encounters, and ultimately the decisions taken.

Watch the entire interview here http://bit.ly/l8m4jc